Countries · Accra
Ghana
Kente cloth, Akan proverb and drum language, and coastal towns that carry a difficult Atlantic history.
Ghanaian cultural knowledge is unusually well organised around proverb and symbol: adinkra signs, drum texts and woven cloth all encode statements that can be read by those taught to read them.
We are collecting with weavers, drummers, linguists and family historians, alongside coastal communities whose histories are bound to the Atlantic trade.
Main languages
Twi · Ewe · Ga · Dagbani · Fante
Places in focus
Accra · Kumasi · Cape Coast · Tamale · Ho
General cultural context; verified records are added community by community.
Kente
The hand-woven strip cloth of the Asante and Ewe, inscribed by UNESCO in 2024, carries names, proverbs and status in its patterns.
Drum as language
Talking drums reproduce the tones of spoken Akan, allowing praise, warning and history to be drummed rather than said.
Coastal memory
Fishing towns and forts along the coast hold oral accounts of trade, departure and return.
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From the archive
Ghana
From the community
Contributed to Ghana
Submissions from contributors, published after cultural review.
No community submissions have been published for Ghana yet. Yours could be the first.
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Did You Know?
Short facts, objects and traditions from the archive. Tap a card to read the full entry and its source.